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Polio vaccine & SV40 contamination

Review of the health consequences of SV40 contamination of poliomyelitis vaccines, and in particular a possible association with cancers

14 December 2004

Media reports published claims that some batches of injectable polio vaccines produced in Australia from 1957 to 1963 were contaminated with simian virus called SV40 and that this may be linked to the development of some cancers.

The Therapeutic Goods Administration commissioned an external expert in the field of infectious disease to review the published literature concerning the human health risk of vaccines contaminated with SV40. Professor Cossart AO is Bosch Professor of Infectious Disease at the University of Sydney and a world renowned virologist.

No new information has become available since the completion of this report.

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